Anambra gov’t challenges Obi over N2.13bn ecological fund claim

The Anambra State Government has challenged former governor Peter Obi to explain the whereabouts of an alleged N2.13 billion ecological fund which he claimed was left in a First Bank account at the University of Nigeria, Awka branch, when he left office in 2014.

The Commissioner for Information and Value Reformation, Law Mefor, made the challenge in a statement responding to a viral post by Obi titled “Phantom Debts and Ecological Loan Fallacy.”

Mefor said Obi had claimed that as of March 17, 2014, he left a balance of over N2.13 billion in First Bank Account No. 2018779464 at the UNIZIK Branch, Awka.

He said the state government obtained a certified statement of the account from its inception to date and found that the account was an Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) Consolidated Revenue Account, rather than an ecological fund account.

Mefor claimed that the account had never recorded an inflow or balance of N2.13 billion or any similar amount since it was opened in 2011.

He also referred to the disputed N75 billion figure described by the former administration as savings or investments, saying the current government would not engage in what he described as “creative accounting.”

According to the statement, the State Government wrote:
“We have obtained a certified print out of the said account from inception to date. First, the account is an Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) Consolidated Revenue Account, and NOT an ecological fund account. Second, from 2011 when the account was opened until date, there has never been any such amount-whether as inflow or balance-in the account.”

“Since HE Peter Obi raised the issue and admitted that his government received such an amount and it is evident that no such an amount ever entered into the account that he cited, it behoves on HE Peter Obi to tell us where exactly his government kept the money or is the money missing? There must be something about this N2.13bn that he should bring it up even when it was never mentioned by the Hon. Commissioner. Curious!”

“Finally, we do not wish to be drawn into the nebulous creative accounting that generated the phantom N75 billion savings or investment which the previous administration has vigorously disputed.”

“If HE Peter Obi raised the issue and admitted that his government received such an amount and it is evident that no such an amount ever entered into the account that he cited, it behoves on HE Peter Obi to tell us where exactly his government kept the money or is the money missing?”

“First, there is the arrears of salaries to staff of defunct Water Corporation, which lingered throughout HE Peter Obi’s tenure, culminating in court processes and judgments. It is this administration that has negotiated a settlement and already paid the first two instalments of the agreed three installmental payments.”

“Second, there are arrears of salaries, pensions and gratuities owed to primary school teachers under the local government system during the Gov Mbadinuju’s tenure. The attention of our administration has recently been drawn to these lingering arrears.”

“We have been informed that the government of HE Peter Obi verified and certified the debt of 16 months of salary arrears and agreed to pay in tranches. It only paid five months and no more until today. This administration has set up a committee headed by the Head of Service to finalise a new verification for us to pay.”

“Your Excellency, you owed salaries, pensions and gratuities. Many of these people are still alive and can testify. It is not good to speak loudly without facts or with fabricated figures. How can you say that if we show one person that you owed you will quit your 2027 presidential campaign? No, we don’t want you to quit and we wish you well. But you obviously LIED: you owed many, not one, and those debts are yet to be fully cleared even today!”